Reunion
by Bookish Brownie
Summary: The Lost Years of Merlin Saga. More than twenty-five years after The Wings of Merlin, Merlin returns to Hallia.


A/N: This is my first attempt at non-Harry Potter fiction. Everything belongs to the great T.A. Barron; I am merely playing. Enjoy.

"Hello, Hallia."

She always hated dreams such as these. They all started the same way. First, he would greet her. Then, she would stare at him in disbelief before running into his arms. They were sweet dreams, but it was always so hard to wake from them.

"I'm not a dream, Hallia." His lips turned upward the slightest amount.

"Young hawk?" He nodded and drew closer to her.

"I can prove it if you follow me." Unbidden, her legs carried her out of the small cottage she shared with Rhia and Elen. As she walked into the meadow, Merlin was already changing into the graceful and powerful form of a stag, with a full eight points on each side of his head.

It seemed she could do nothing but follow as her strides melted into the fluidity of a deer's motion. They ran for miles. Hallia was unused to the speed because she had only transformed occasionally since Avalon was created and Merlin left to shape the destiny of another people.

Finally, they stopped at a small brook. While still walking, they shifted back into their human forms. She had her first chance to look at him properly. He looked older. But it was the age care and responsibility rather than advancing years. Suddenly, she was almost angry with him. How dare he expect them to pick up where they left off after more than twenty-five years?

Bitterness slipped into her question, "How is your prince?"

"He will not be born for many lives of men." Pain suffused his features. "I'm so sorry, Hallia. You know I never wanted to leave you. I came back because I miss you and Rhia and Mother. I have no expectations."

Anger drained away, replaced with a cold weariness. "Are you reading my mind now, young hawk?"

The slightest smile graced his features. "A little. It's only fair, since you were always able to see right through me." Her mouth curled upward in return, but she wasn't ready to give in completely. "You can ask me anything."

"If you're here, I want you in my life, young hawk; you know that. But I don't think I could take your leaving again. Why have you come back now? How long do you intend to stay?" She swallowed against her heart surging in her chest, not wanting to get her hopes up.

"I've done what I needed to do, and I only have to wait for the appointed time. And I plan to stay as long as you and Avalon will have me."

She sighed. She had hoped he would say that, but a part of her still didn't believe him. She'd never had any real convictionthat he would return, despite the prodding of her dreams. And now she was so stuck in her routines that she didn't know how to be with him.

She had come to expect his absence. It defined her more than she liked to admit. Rhia and Elen were the only ones who never told her to move on. Several times she had almost given in to her neighbors' requests to meet with this or that suitor.

But then she looked at them. They could never compare to her impetuous, brave, kind, impossibly stubborn young hawk.

And now he was back.

And it wasn't a dream.

So she kissed him. She kissed him for being real and for giving her hope and for remembering all they had.

He grinned. "I've missed that." She smiled, but, as vapors of doubts that started to float through her mind, he looked horrified. "There's never been anyone but you, Eo-Lahallia. And there will never be anyone but you."

"I'm glad to hear that." She paused. Her greatest dream was coming true and she seemed intent upon sabotaging it. "But I still don't know what to do."

"As I said, I don't harbor any expectations that things will immediately be as they once were between us. I'm just glad to be here."

His smile had the same power over her as ever. Suddenly, she knew. "Marry me, Olo Eopia, my young hawk." She wasn't deluding herself. It obviously wouldn't make everything perfect between them. But he had promised he would stay as long as she wanted him.

She wanted forever.

Despite his apparent ability to read others' thoughts, he still seemed shocked. "I would be delighted to, but are you sure?"

"Yes, we may still have many things to sort, but I never doubted our love." She drew out the twisted string that he had given her before he flew off to that other world. "So where, indeed, does the source of music lie?"

"Is it in the strings themselves? Or in the hands that pluck them?" His beaming grin took over his whole face. "You know, I still haven't quite figured out what that means."

She gave a brief laugh. "I haven't either, but it's still ours." Suddenly, he was standing very close to her again, and for a time there were no more words.

They were yet to face much heart-wrenching toil and troubling separation, but that moment was perfect.

_Finis_


End file.
